This course provides a treatment of the storage, conversion, and conservation of energy using advanced materials. The course is designed for one credit and it will be divided into three themes:

• Synthesis of Advanced Energy Materials
• Surface Characterization
• Assembly of Energy Storage Devices

The physical nature of energy materials will be developed from a ‘bottom up’ perspective, beginning with the manner in which such materials can be synthesized. The synthesis topics will include detailed treatments of both dry (e.g., CVD) and wet chemical approaches. The content will also incorporate contemporary research directions, such as directed/patterned synthesis in situ.  After synthesis, the technologist must know the quality of the materials that have been synthesized, and the course will cover a diverse range of contemporary surface characterization methods. Here, fundamental understanding of these methods will be developed, as a foundation for those who work with energy storage materials but might not have a deep background in analytical methods.  Finally, the course will focus on functional characteristics of assembled devices for a variety of energy-related purposes including storage, conversion, and conservation. Here, the course will cover basic functional characterization techniques with reference to state-of-the-art technologies, as well as the means of establishing objective comparisons of performance within and among competing approaches to electrical energy storage.

The course will be taught by leading experts in the field. The international faculty have been pioneers in online education innovations. For example, Prof. Reifenberger offers global courses through nanoHUB-U on Atomic Force Microscopy (https://nanohub.org/courses/AFM1) and Modern Physics (https://nanohub.org/courses/phys342). Prof. Fisher has taught a nanoHUB-U course on Thermal Energy at the Nanoscale (https://nanohub.org/courses/TE). Similarly, the lectures to be offered in the GIAN effort will be recorded for posting to the GIAN portal and nanoHUB as a special-topics course, thus enabling students to refer back to the lectures in virtual perpetuity. The national faculty experts actively working in the specified areas of research all over India will be invited to participate in this program at a later stage.

The lecture presentation materials will be provided to all students (they will also be available through the online course site). These materials will be used by students in daily quizzes that promote and measure learning, as well as giving the instructors prompt feedback on the conveyance of important topics in the course. The final session will include a comprehensive exam that will be used to assess overall learning goals.